Day 4: London, it’s on

So the Emirates Palace was dope.

We had an ace night dining on traditional Emirati food, and the breakfast buffet was devine. We couldn’t resist ingesting more inert material, so we capped off our stay with a gold flake cappuccino.

More like MMMMirates Palace

There’s not too much to really write about, as today was basically spent in transit. I managed to finish a somewhat lacklustre miniseries (I presume by the BBC) on child abduction and race relations within the English foster care system called Kiri. I’d give it a 6.8/10. It tried. Mercifully the food was slightly better on this flight than the last, but I must admit, the coffee I drank in my economy class seat flying over Turkey seemed incredibly average, when compared to my gleeful coffee number one of the day.

The (briefly) mighty have well and truly fallen (back into middle class)

After a (thankfully) uneventful flight, we landed in Heathrow airport. We then stood in a queue for THREE BLOODY HOURS!!! SERIOUSLY!!! Anyone who knows me at least semi well, will be familiar with how much I love to put my grievances into angry, verbose prose, for no real reason other than to ventilate my minor inconveniences to unwitting Facebook friends. I have so much to say about how unimpressed I was, but I fear this blog will disintegrate into a tirade of curses so I’ll try and show some restraint.

Whenever I come through the arrivals gates at Heathrow, I can’t help but imagine I’m in the last scene of Love Actually. I’ve got Hugh Grant’s delightful opening monologue stuck in my head but rather than cartwheel through the corridor in a pink dress to be greeted by Idris Elba like I was looking forward to imagining, I’m low level homicidal as I lug my bag to Boots to try and get a sandwich.

Ok.

Actually.

I take back my comment about showing some restraint… I need to write about my plastic bag gripe.

To set the scene, British people love a good meal deal (this usually consists of a sandwich, snack and drink for a low price bought from either a pharmacy or a newsagent and most often consumed during a weekday lunch). I bought two (non-meal deal) sandwiches, proceeded to pay for them (please clearly note that the price of these sandwiches superseded the price of a single meal deal) using my Australian credit card (hello conversion fee) and then, foolish me, had the audacity to ask for a plastic bag.

This is exactly what happened with absolutely no creative license taken with the wording, I swear:

“That will be 5p,” the nark at the counter told me.

“I don’t have 5p. I have a $50 note, but you and I don’t want me to have to break that, do we?” I calmly replied.

Nark: Use your card again.

Haddy (politely): Dear sir, the conversion fee is far in excess of 5p, it would hardly be worth the kerfuffle, do you not concur?

Nark: Sorry ma’am.

At this point, I picked up two bags and two sandwiches in my four arms. Okay that didn’t happen, and if I had four arms I promise you I would have just left it alone, but because I only have two, once I got to the perimeter of the scene, I couldn’t help it. I wanted vengeance blood the damn bag.

We resume where we left off:

Haddy: Hello again, kind fellow. I am sorry to be of a petulant nature, but I must urge you to reconsider and bequeath me a bag for these bread lined chicken vessels.

Nark: There’s CCTV here and I’m not allowed. The bags are only for the meal deal or they’re 5p.

Haddy: ….

Nark: ………

Haddy: …………………

Nark: Well, I guess there’s no audio on the CCTV so they won’t have to know.

Haddy (maintaining a veil of polite indignation): (?!?!?!?!?!?!?!)

Nark: Gives Haddy the bag.

VICTORY.

Too right plastic bags can be dangerous… to the soul

Seriously. I can’t tell you the damage 3 hours in a queue does to your psyche, but in my head this was playing out like a strategy scene from The Art of War. The victory felt meaningful. And that was enough to sustain me as I sit here on the underground writing this entry.

The accomodation we are staying in here is an Airbnb over in the east of London. The host is a Michelin starred chef and breakfast is included (yee haw). There is still at least an hour of transit time to go and I am thoroughly wiped out. I’m feeling a bit motion sick typing this right now, so I will leave it there.

Tomorrow we are starting the day with high tea at The Ritz, so I need my beauty sleep. Catch you in the morning.

Haddy x

PS – I’m starting to write a few fashion / beauty articles on the side if you’re at all interested! Bear with me whilst I try and expand my blog to get a look book section, it always seems to take much longer than I anticipate.

“Whenever I get gloomy with the state of the world, I think about the arrivals gate at Heathrow Airport. General opinion’s starting to make out that we live in a world of hatred and greed, but I don’t see that. It seems to me that love is everywhere. Often it’s not particularly dignified or newsworthy, but it’s always there – fathers and sons, mothers and daughters, husbands and wives, boyfriends, girlfriends, old friends. When the planes hit the Twin Towers, as far as I know none of the phone calls from the people on board were messages of hate or revenge – they were all messages of love. If you look for it, I’ve got a sneaky feeling you’ll find that love actually is all around.” – Hugh Grant, Love Actually